12-yr-old boy held hostage killed in J&K encounter

“The operation began in the morning and the forces could have ended it within a few hours, but the police and army officers present on the encounter site made every attempt to rescue my son. My son wasn’t allowed to leave the house despite several pleas from officials and the locals. I think militant held my son hostage as they thought this could save their lives.”

The police and army officers appealed to the militants through local village elders, asking the captors to release the boy. But the militants didn’t budge, even after the minor’s mother, Sharifa Begum, pleaded with the militants to release her only son.

The mother, who was being consoled by relatives and neighbours, said: “My brother-in-law, who was also held hostage along with my son, told me that he had pleaded with the militants to release his nephew but they refused. And when the militants got injured, my brother-in-law escaped from the house.”

The operation ended on Friday morning and police took bodies of the two militants and the minor boy with them. The body of the minor was handed over to family members in the afternoon.

Senior superintendent of police, Bandipore, Rahul Malik said the security forces had done everything possible to get the militants to release the boy and his uncle, including getting their relatives and members of the local community and the mosque to make appeals to the captors.

A magistrate too had appealed that the boy be allowed to go “but finally fire from that side intensified and we also retaliated and in process two militants, Ali and Hubaib, were eliminated,” Malik said.

SSP Malik said the police received information from the rescued civilians that the minor boy was held hostage by Ali. “He didn’t allow the boy to go out and he killed the boy before we stormed the building,” he said.